


Counting Down to Thunder

by HappyGetLucky



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: Alternate Universe-Prison, Hate Crimes, Homophobia, M/M, Minor Character Death, Poetry, Prison, Protective!Josh, Slurs, Tator Tot Tussles, Violence, handjobs, poetry is sexy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-19
Updated: 2019-05-19
Packaged: 2020-03-08 01:44:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18885571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HappyGetLucky/pseuds/HappyGetLucky
Summary: Josh is the only person in the A Block of Franklin County Correctional Facility who has taken another human’s life. Until he isn't.*Josh and Tyler are in jail and in love. Josh will do whatever it takes to protect Tyler--even change.





	Counting Down to Thunder

**Author's Note:**

> I watched too much 60 Days In. I'm mentioning here that this is OITNB inspired, but I've never even seen a single episode of the show.

Josh is the only person in the A Block of Franklin County Correctional Facility who has taken another human’s life.

But that’s not what he’s in for.

He was picked up for squatting in abandoned houses on Columbus’s less lustrous side. The four grams of cocaine he had on him were nothing but coincidence. When the inmates tell their stories (and they always do), crowded around one of the steel tables that’s bolted down into the concrete floor of the dayroom, Josh always takes the time to add here: “I was only holding it for a friend.”

It always gets a laugh.

Even from Tyler Joseph, the newest A Block inmate. Orange has never looked so good, Josh thinks, not as it does against Tyler’s tanned skin. It’s a dangerous thought to have. Attraction prefaces anxiety, so Josh makes sure not to aim his smile at the other man for a moment longer than he would at anyone else. Even here in the minimum-security wing of the prison where things are ‘tame’, where there are no bars, no screeching, slamming metal doors to separate the bunks, where the crimes and sentences are mostly non-violent—even here, no one wants to _admit_ they like dick.

He lets one of the other guys ask Tyler what he was picked up for.

Tyler hides his smile behind his hand. “Some bullshit.”

Hands slap the table punctuating cries of _Amen_!, echoing off the tall ceilings like gunshots. Someone claps Tyler on the back and the grin that blooms can’t be smothered by that hand—his sleeve rides up and there are rings of dark tattoos around the thin wrist, disappearing under his jumpsuit. That’s all it takes: the smile, the tattoos, the bashfulness. Josh grins down at the table, one thumb scratching at his own tattoo, and thinks: _I’m fucked._

He spends the rest of his afternoon in his bunk, staring out the narrow doorway as the influx of new inmates get settled. Josh had been here long enough—and is respected well enough—to have a semi-private bed in a bunk. There aren’t any doors, but at least he isn’t out in the dayroom sleeping on a mat on the floor. Not like Tyler, who has dragged his mat and bedding to a free spot against the wall in between two other new inmates.

Josh shouldn’t already be thinking of who Tyler can replace among the bunks. Who Josh could intimidate to giving up their bed so that Tyler isn’t sleeping in the open. What he could leverage. And when he thinks about the other man taking up residence in Josh’s _own_ bunk—he has to change his train of thought. There’s no worse place to get an erection than in jail. There’s no worse faux pas to make than revealing his hand: his sexuality or his fondness for any other human being. That will do nothing but bring trouble down on his head like a roof caving in. His head and Tyler’s.

“What’s good?” his bunkmate asks, shuffling in, dirty socks against the floor. He isn’t the worst guy: doesn’t snore when he sleeps, minds his fucking business, and isn’t going to be here for much longer. Sometimes when he wears the top half of his jumpsuit down tied around his waist, Josh can see a tattoo on his upper arm, some sort of emblem that makes him think he’s ex-military. A lot of the guys in here are.

Josh holds up the tattered paperback that he’s been clutching in his lap. He doesn’t read it half as often as he just holds it these days.

“More poetry? Go ahead and soliloquy me.”

“Sol—no, that’s not right. You’re using that word wrong.”

“Don’t know why you read that bullshit,” he mutters, rifling through the top bunk, papers shuffling, wrappers crackling. “No offense.”

He’s pretty fucking offended, actually. For a moment it lights a fucking match in him. He hears the click of a gas stove being turned on, waiting for the familiar anger to spark—but he breathes. And breathes. And lets it run off of his back like water off a duck, because anger in here needs to be treated like a precious commodity: stored, potential maximized. “You haven’t read the dirty ones,” he bluffs, thumbing through the pages so that the ruffled air brushes his face. He thinks that maybe he can smell something, some hint of familiar cologne. But that’s just in his head. He knows that.

“No fucking shit? Like that Fifty Shades of Gray stuff? Fucking _word_ porn. I didn’t think _porn_ could be boring.”

“Everything here is boring.”

“No shit. But you know what wouldn’t be boring?” his bunkmate asks, slipping on his shower shoes.

“What’s that?”

“Real porn!”

Watching Tyler Joseph becomes something like Josh’s porn. Better, maybe.

It takes practice to keep close watch on someone in such close quarters without letting them know. There are people here who are frightening in their perception, who make a living off of watching each other for weaknesses that can be exploited. He does his best not to vary his routine: morning meal at seven AM, evening meal at six PM, cards and television and working out all in between. But everything he does now, he does with his head turned just towards that mattress against the wall where Tyler sometimes lounges, a towel over his face to block out some of the light and the noise.

When Tyler grows bored with laying on his mat, he wanders to the table where cards are being played. Heart thudding, Josh leaves his bunk. He takes the seat beside Tyler and watches as the other’s scoot and make room for him. They pass him the deck to deal. It feels good to outrank everyone at the table, to know that they respect him and maybe even fear him. His gut clenches, wondering if Tyler notices that. If he knows what that means. If it impresses him. _Attracts_ him.

The table is full of players now, and Josh tells himself this is normal. This is _useful_. He gets to know everyone who comes into Block A. He is the gate: the one that people will pass through if there is no fuckery to be had, and the one that will have to stop any fuckery he finds. The conversation flows. On television is a football game, and there is general loud bickering about it. Tyler sits quietly, rearranging the cards in his hand again and again, close enough that Josh can feel how warm he must be, still bundled up to the throat in his jumpsuit.

“Nice tattoos,” Tyler says. It makes Josh’s mouth dry. He holds out his bare arm, clenching a fist to admire the way his muscles seem sculpted out of the bark and sky inked on his skin.

“Thanks,” he says. Daringly: “Yours too.”

Tyler’s eyebrows jump. His hand moves back to his mouth, hiding his expression behind it. It can’t hide how his face turn red though, nor the crinkle of his eyes, little joyful crow’s feet. “Thanks,” Tyler says.

“First time in?—yeah, I figured,” Josh says. He lowers his voice, leaning in, pretending to be secretive just so he can smell Tyler’s sweat and the soap from the shower he took during intake procedures. “Tell me. What are you really in here for? Not that bullshit answer you gave your first day.”

Tyler puts his cards face down on the table, plants his chin in the palm of his hand, and appraises Josh with half-lidded eyes. The guy is so fucking pretty—eyes brown-gold like whiskey or maple syrup, nose straight, skin unblemished, looking so fucking feminine, no chance in hell he can grow a beard, probably doesn’t even have hair on his chest. His words when he speaks are careful and slow: “I got caught with a backpack full of lifted car radios.”

“You need to try harder if you’re going to lie,” Josh says under his breath. There is way too much eye contact going on. It feels like foreplay, and it’s absolutely definitely mutual. There’s no mistaking the hypnotized look on Tyler’s face. This is dangerous, so fucking dangerous. God he needs to look away before he gets hard. “Lie _better_.”

“What makes you think I’m lying?”

“Because I know the law. Theft under 1k isn’t going to land you in here.”

“No. It didn’t. The gun I had on me did.” Josh leans away from him in surprise, shocked right out of his arousal, squinting like he’s trying to look right through Tyler for the truth. The other man’s face is serious, solemn. No lies. Tyler adds: “I was only holding it for a friend, though.”

After he’s finished laughing, Josh holds out a hand and introduces himself. Up close he sees that Tyler is older than he looks. Definitely no kid here, Josh thinks with warmth in the pit of his gut. Thank _God_. “If you need anything around here, I’m the guy you ask,” Josh admits.

Tyler licks his lips. Josh looks down at his hand, shuffles the card order.

“Well?” Josh says to the men crowded around who have been shouting at the game on the television. “Are we going to play, or what?”

#

The showers are communal, two separate rooms with four showerheads in each section to accommodate all of the men in A Block, open from morning to night. When he first came to jail, this was the part that concerned Josh most. It turned out to be nothing like the movies; most guys don’t want anything to do with showering next to another dick. Even if two or more guys do end up in the same shower room at the same time, they stand as far away from each other as possible, talking with their heads turned away.  

Josh has never in his entire four-month stint at Franklin’s had to worry about popping a boner in the shower.

But that was before Tyler Joseph.

Josh doesn’t even let himself look. The first time he was showering and glanced up to see Tyler shuffling into the showers, jumpsuit half undone, tugging off the white standard wifebeater underneath, it was enough. The glimpse he got of smooth, tanned skin was enough. The split-second image of tattoos (weird looking ones on each of Tyler’s pecs, on his biceps too)—it’s more than fucking enough.

“Jesus,” he mutters under his breath, reaching for the shampoo he bought from commissary. He lathers his hair and lets it run in his eyes, stinging. He’d drown himself under the spray if it meant not getting an erection ten feet from the other guy—

“Smells good,” Tyler says from fucking _right next to him_. “How do I get some of that?”

“Jesus—do you fucking mind--? This is—give me some space. _Je_ sus.”

He can hear the wet shuffle of shower-shoes taking a few steps back. “Sorry,” Tyler says, and he has the distinct feeling that Tyler is grinning, but when he cracks his eyes open to look, they’re still full of shampoo and fucking _hell_ it stings. “I just don’t have any soap. I’m not really sure where to get any.”

“You’ve got to buy it. I’ll fucking show you how afterwards, just—look, there’s an etiquette okay?”

“An etiquette.”

“Yeah—”

“ _Prison_ etiquette.”

Something in that tone rubs Josh the wrong way. “What, you think that etiquette has such a fancy connotation that it can’t be used in a less refined environment? There’s etiquette in everything, asshole. Etiquette for shitting. Etiquette in the Amazon, in the Arctic Circle, and yes even in prison—”

“Okay,” Tyler says. The shampoo is almost gone from Josh’s eyes now, and he squints at Tyler, keeping his eyes firmly and very safely above the waist, thanks. “I didn’t know. I think I need a teacher. Can you help me?”

“Sure,” Josh says. He points. “Lesson one. Don’t shower by another guy. Go over there. Further.  Yeah. Now turn around, and pretend I’m not here.”

Tyler’s shoulders are shaking with what Josh thinks is laughter. With him turned away, Josh lets himself get one single look, trailing his eyes down Tyler’s back, the sharp shoulder blades, the dimples at the base of his spine and fuck yeah, his ass, which is very admirable but not very helpful when it comes to not getting hard. “Am I doing it right?” Tyler asks.

“Yeah you fucking are,” Josh mutters. Louder: “Depends. Are you pretending I’m not here?”

Tyler doesn’t answer, which is progress at least. Josh reaches out and turns his showerhead to cold, rinsing the rest of the soap and arousal off of him and down the drain. He barely drags the towel across his body before he is pulling on underclothes and jumpsuit, feeling the cloth stick to his damp skin.

“Look,” he says, keeping an eye on the door to make sure no one else comes in or is lingering in the doorway listening to them talk. Their voices would probably be drowned out by the roar of the showers, but you never can know. “You’re going to get yourself hurt. You need to be more careful. If I was anybody else—?”

When he looks over his shoulder, there is nothing mirthful about Tyler’s face. It’s empty, maybe angry. He scoffs, leaning his head under the spray for a moment to wet his hair before shaking it out, reminding Josh a little of a dog. “Save it,” he says. “I don’t need _mothered_.”

If Tyler was any other inmate, Josh wouldn’t be able to let it slide. It had taken months for him to earn the level of respect he had now, and it was an exhausting thing to maintain; dynamics and politics were constantly shifting with the influx of new inmates and the leaving of older ones. It was an old dance, one that was began long before Josh was put away and one that would continue long after he heard his name called to be processed out. But it was founded on the principles that respect was earned and that disrespect had to be punished. Swiftly.

But the idea of threatening, intimidating or hurting Tyler makes his stomach turn. It makes him think of brown eyes just as soft and scared. So scared. He smells that cologne, and he doesn’t know how something that’s just in his head could feel so _real_.

“Talk to anybody else like that and you’ll get your ass beat,” says Josh before ducking out and back into the dayroom. Tyler calls something after him, but it is lost, and Josh thinks it might be for the best.

#

There’s tension. Josh has been so focused on Tyler for the last few days that he doesn’t notice it right away, convinced that the feeling of walking on a tight rope is just in his head, leftover anxiety from maybe showing too much of his hand to Tyler that day in the showers. But still. While eating breakfast, his leg wants to bounce underneath the table, and he doesn’t know why.

Raised voices a few tables over. It’s easy to tell the difference between the usual ruckus and the sound of a kettle ready to whistle, the foaming of a pot ready to boil over. One man is seated, new, probably brought in the same time as Tyler—the other is an inmate Josh only knows as Hanson. Possession with intent to distribute. He’s not a bad guy, but lots of them aren’t; they’ll just do bad things. Josh doesn’t stop eating. But he stops paying attention to the Maury reruns on television across the room—he’s seen this episode before anyway.

“What’s the problem?” asks Josh to the guy next to him, pointing to the gesticulating inmates across the room.

“New guy promised his hash browns to MMM-bop last night in exchange for an extra towel.” The inmate sniffs, stuffing his mouth. “Dunno what he’d give them up for. These potatoes are the shit.”

Josh thinks that’s being a little optimistic—about the potatoes, that is. He’s had better. He remembers mornings after college waking up early to the smell of bacon on the stove, coming out of his bedroom to find the table set for two, a figure at the countertop pouring coffee for the both of them—

It’s common for new inmates to be tested like this. It’s not so much about breakfast foods or commissary items; it’s about pushing boundaries, seeing who crumbles and who can withstand the pressure. It’s about seeing who keeps their word and who goes back on it. When Josh goes to take his tray back, he hears another inmate telling the new guy (Dwayne, he thinks. DWI—his second) that he should probably lace up.

So, Josh laces up too. His tennis shoes are underneath his bunk pushed to the back by the wall. He doesn’t anticipate being in the fight, but it’s better to be safe than with broken toes. Then he stands in the door to his bunk, watching. Waiting. More and more tennis shoes emerge and even though Josh can’t see through the tinted glass of the shack where the guards keep watch, he imagines that they’re waiting too. The officers here know the signs.

Across the room, Tyler is sitting on his mattress, back against the wall. There’s a notebook in his lap that he flips through absently, eyes flickering around the tense groups of inmates. Doesn’t take a genius to feel the unhappy energy in the air. Eventually his eyes flicker towards Josh, narrowing. Josh points down to his shoes, then at Tyler’s sock-covered feet.

Tyler’s head cocks.

Josh points again. _Shoes_.

Tyler makes a violent wave of his hand when he realizes Josh is trying to _mother him_. But it doesn’t change the warmth that blooms in Josh’s gut when he sees Tyler drag his tennis shoes from the pile of personal items he has beside his mat, tugging them on over his socks and lacing them sloppily.

When the showers open for the day, Hanson comes by Josh’s cell. He doesn’t say that he’s looking for Josh’s approval, but it’s a sign of respect to let the block’s boss know when you plan to make moves. Josh thinks fighting over hash browns is the dumbest fucking thing he’s ever heard of, but he knows that it’s not about the hash browns. _Do what you have to do_ , Josh tells him. They clasp hands. He can feel Tyler’s eyes on him (or is that wishful thinking?) and ignores the sour feeling of shame in his gut.

When the fight happens, Josh isn’t even there to see it. He’s in his bunk, lounging with the book of poetry on his chest. Fights usually happen in one of two places, the tiny curtained-off section at the back of cells where the toilets are, or in the showers where there are no cameras, and the angle of the hallway means that the correctional officers can’t glance in and see what’s happening. Today, it’s the showers. There come shouts, louder than the water’s roar, and then the screeching of the doors opening as CO’s come to break up the fight. Josh gets up then, book in hand, to watch the commotion from his cell. The new inmate’s face is smeared with blood. He’ll go to medical, spend some time in solitary confinement, but probably be returned to the cell block by the day after tomorrow. Hopefully wiser, Josh thinks.

An officer comes by to talk to him. It’s Quentin, though most of the inmates call him Q-tip because of his skinny stature and penchant for being the guard who always has to stick himself where he doesn’t belong: cell block politics. They can be slow on the uptake, but some things are too obvious even for the CO’s to miss from behind the frosted glass they watch the inmates from. Josh runs the floor, so not much happens without Josh knowing about it.

“What’s good Q.” They clasp hands. Like Josh doesn’t already know, he asks: “You here on business or pleasure?”

 “What was all that about?” Q asks, jerking a thumb towards Hanson who is insisting that the guy slipped in the showers and that he busted his knuckles trying to help him up. Even with a few people backing up his story (and the other guys—even ones who were _in the shower_ — insisting they didn’t see _nothing_ ), he’ll probably get some time alone in solitary too.

“Did I miss something?” says Josh. He holds up his book. “I was in here reading. This is engrossing stuff.”

“What was the fight about, Josh?”

Josh rubs at one eye, raising his eyebrows. “What fight? Sounds like somebody fell. Showers, man. Slippery when wet.”

Q rolls his eyes. This is a conversation they have often. “Don’t insult me. If something jogs your memory? Press the buzzer.”

Josh won’t be pressing any buzzer.

Everybody knows what happens to snitches.

At the evening chow time, Tyler slips into line right behind Josh. He can feel him there, a burning, throbbing presence not too different from a threatening migraine.

“You really are the guy who runs this place, aren’t you?” Tyler says under his breath.

Josh glances over his shoulder to appraise the other man’s face, but he’s never considered himself to be great at understanding facial expressions. “For now,” Josh says. Because really? It’s complicated.

Tyler crosses his arms. “Alright then. Are you going to show me how this commissary stuff works, or what?”

#

“It’s a touch screen. Just press here and enter your pin—they gave you your pin when you finished being processed in, right? Told you to memorize it, right?”

“Yeah, it’s 0—”

“Fucking hell, don’t tell it to me, Jesus!” Josh rubs at his eyes.

“You’re so easy to rile up,” Tyler mutters. “Okay. Okay. I entered my pin. It’s safe to look now.”

“Now it’s divided up into categories. Toiletries, snacks, luxury items, all the good stuff. It’s all overpriced, so make sure you check your balance before you buy anything. They’ll charge you into the red to a certain extent and then make you pay before processing you out. If you’ve got family, you have to let them know how to put money into your account. Easy-peasy, am I right?”

Tyler goes right to the toiletries, scrolls to find the body wash that Josh was using in the shower. He purchases it. Josh’s mouth goes dry. He claps Tyler on the shoulder. “Looks like you’ve got the hang of it.”

#

The razors come in twice a week. They are electric, with blades so deeply embedded and hidden by shave guards that he can run his finger along them all day before he breaks his skin. Even after buzzing his hair, when he runs his hands across his jaw there is always the sting of stubble. There are enough for every man to get his own, still smelling of the sterilization solution. Josh and his bunkmate help each other, because there are no mirrors.

When he wants to, Josh is capable of growing facial hair. Which is more than he can say of Tyler, he thinks, remembering the smattering of hair at the center of his chest from their time together in the shower, remembering the fine leg hairs. Tyler doesn’t even go to the guards for a razor, just lies on his bunk, reading a book.

Josh has wandered close enough to see that it’s The Hobbit, which—nice.

“Can’t wait to get real fucking razors,” the other man mutters. “These are shit.”

Josh hums. He read The Hobbit in high school and had loved it, the world building, the history, the iconic quotes that made him feel understood even with the high fantasy universe. He’s always been a Tolkien fan—

“You can’t help me shave when you’re looking at Joseph,” his bunkie mutters, pressing his lips together to rub the razor at the space beneath his nostrils. The sentence drops into his gut like a heavy stone, like the quarters he used to drop in the fountain at the local mall, wishing for fuck-knows-what.

“I’m helping.”

“You’ve got to be more careful, brother,” he says. He drags a rough washcloth over his face to wipe away any stray hairs. “Well?” He asks Josh.

“Still fucking ugly.”

“Man!”

#

Josh licks his lips. Beneath the fullness of his bottom lip is a tiny knot of scar tissue from where he once had it pierced. That had been during his emo phase, when he realized that he was a dusty doormat that people felt inclined to walk over and wipe their shoes on. There’d been a series of physical changes he’d made to himself to try to be more intimidating and less approachable. What a misguided kid he’d been. He rolls the lip into his mouth to drag the knot over his bottom teeth, all the while looking over the cards in his hand. They aren’t allowed to play any card game that involves gambling, but so long as nothing it being laid on the table, it doesn’t stop them from pretending.

Beside him is Tyler, cards flat on the table, hiding his mouth behind his hand. Probably bluffing, and badly, but Josh hasn’t been able to focus on the game, not when Tyler’s a wall of solid heat next to him, close enough that their thighs brush considering how packed the tables are. It’s distracting—that heat, that thigh all he can fucking think about, wondering if maybe Tyler could feel that little scar from his old lip ring if Tyler would take his lip into his mouth—

Metal screeches as the door of A Block is thrown open. Everybody turns. In comes a flood of CO’s, their latex gloves on. All the shouting echoes off the ceiling and makes it hard to understand, but anybody who’s been in Franklin long knows what’s being said. Bitching and moaning, people lazily start separating, ambling back towards their cells.

“What’s going on?” Tyler asks, voice nearly drowned out under the officers herding inmates into their cells like cattle.

“Shakedown,” says Josh. He puts a hand on Tyler’s shoulder and steers him towards his own cell. Even the guys who bunk on the floor have to go somewhere, Josh tells himself.

The officers start at either end in two groups, ushering one cell of inmates out at a time while they rifle through their belongings.

“What are they looking for?” Tyler asks, chewing on his fingernails.

“Anything, really. Weapons. Alcohol. Drugs.”

“Hoarded linens,” Josh’s cellmate mutters. Josh flips him the bird. He’d spent 24 hours in solitary for that one, but he couldn’t help it. The nights get chilly. 

“It’s probably because of the tater-tot tussle earlier this week,” Josh says. There’s a little altercation when someone down the row gets mouthy with a CO looking through his personal letters, but it fizzles out. The letters are clean, folded and placed back in their spots. The line moves on.

“ _Tater-tot tussle?”_ Tyler smiles. It’s way too fucking cute, all cheeks and crooked teeth and squinted eyes.

“Hey—that book you’re reading all the time—” Josh’s bunkmate starts. He lowers his voice. “—is it that 50 Shades of Gray stuff? Because if so, do a guy a solid and let him borrow it, huh?”

This time they all laugh, and so loud that the CO’s shout at them to shut the hell up. But who the hell cares?

It’s Q who comes by Josh’s cell. They’re in the doorway where cameras are visible, so they don’t clasp hands like usual, but the nod is mutual. Instead of searching their cell, he moves on to the next. “Better not having any extra fucking towels, Dun,” the guard mutters. He points to the cell past Josh’s. “Everybody out.”

“Why didn’t he search here?” Tyler asks under his breath.

Josh just holds up his hand, first two fingers crossed, winks.

**Author's Note:**

> find me on twitter and convince me to finish this fic @ Spooky_Sad
> 
> comment please and support your not so local fic writer, constructive criticism is very very welcome. 
> 
> Thanks to my supporters, B, Alysha, Angie, Aphrodite, Kenzie, Sam, adsnoggin, Becca, Tyler <3


End file.
